Nicholas, Eymericus

, a celebrated Dominican, was born at Gironna, in Catalonia, about 1320. He was made inquisitor general by Innocent VI. about 1356, and afterwards chaplain to Gregory XL and judge of heretical causes. He died Jan. 4, 1399, leaving a precious monument of inquisitorial tyranny, entitled “Directorium Inquisitorium,” or the Inquisitor’s Directory, the best editions of which are those with corrections, particularly that “cum comment. Fran. Pegnse,” printed at Rome, 1587, fol. This book, says L’Avocat, contains the most pernicious and horrible maxims, according to which, not only private persons, but princes and kings, may be condemned secretly by the inquisition, without being permitted to speak in their own defence, and afterwards put to death by poison, or other means. It is astonishing, adds this liberal ecclesiastic, that a work which inculcates such dietestable principles should have been printed at Barcelona, afterwards at Rome, and at Venice. The commentary, he says, is as pernicious as the text. The French have an abridgment of the work, by the abbé Morellet, 1762, 12mo. ²